


The Bridge

by TheDyingSun



Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: I Don't Even Know, M/M, Philosophy, Reincarnation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-19
Updated: 2017-11-19
Packaged: 2019-02-04 03:42:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12762405
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDyingSun/pseuds/TheDyingSun
Summary: “Nothing ever changes,” Tyler observes. He asks again: “why do we keep going back?”“To learn,” Josh recites.





	The Bridge

He doesn't know who he is.

Maybe once there was a person, a boy who lived in the sunlight and cried in the dark. A boy who was always scared and stressed, trying to life a life he wasn't sure he believed in. He remembers pretending- all the time, for reasons that he thought were important. He'd tried to fit in, to be impressive, to live the same way as everyone else.

But he can't remember _why_.

Doesn't matter.

He's one with the trees now, flowing with the stream on the edge of town, watching the masses rush over the bridge. It's daytime, so they're probably hurrying to their jobs, to put forth emotional labour that- in the end- means nothing. Paper might be exchanged and someone somewhere might gain their favour, but the sun still sets and the trees still grow through concrete. And he's still here.

He's always been, he realizes.

It's just that there are lapses in his _being_ , where he'd chosen to be one of those worried creatures for a few decades. He'd chosen, he remembers, to live out their lives and learn their lessons, but now that he's free he's not sure what the point was. Every time he becomes someone, he looses who he is now, and he gets caught up in their trivial desires. When he's human, he only wants to live his life in buildings and in villages, to argue, to feel acceptance, and play the same games over and over and over...

 

“Tyler, geez man,” comes a voice- or a thought- there's not really a word for it. It's another being like himself, caught between forms; they communicate with and without words. “What are you doing all the way out here?”

He doesn't really have a name- none of them do, but he likes to be called Josh. He likes to be thought of as a young man with a bright smile, even though he's a genderless swath of cosmic energy blowing in on the wind.

“It's all so pointless,” Tyler tells him. (Tyler likes being called Tyler, and likes being a boy too, but he honestly doesn't care much anymore. The others can call him what they want, as long as he understands who they're speaking to). “Why do we keep going back, Josh?”

They watch the bridge for a few moments- or minutes- or longer- it's hard to tell and it doesn't matter.

 

The humans are more advanced than ever now, but it just makes them all worry more. Half the people on the bridge have headphones in their ears because they're scared of each other. Those who do interact have no substance; they talk about movies or sports, or discuss the news and shake their heads. There's no emotion between them- they all live outside themselves, just like they always have,

“Nothing ever changes,” Tyler observes. He asks again: “why do we keep going back?”

“To learn,” Josh recites, but by the way he hesitates, it's clear that he knows these words aren't enough. “Tyler look, they're all _us_. They all chose to be there, to keep trying, and keep learning- and when they're done, they'll come back and tell us about it.”

“Why can't we just learn here?” Tyler gestures to himself- sort of. There's nothing solid in him, nothing corporeal to reference, but Josh gets it. “We're talking...” He drifts towards Josh, letting some of their form mix together and mingle. Josh lets out the equivalent of a pleased sigh, enjoying the affection. “We're touching,” Tyler adds uselessly. “Anything we can do out there we can do here.” Tyler creeps closer to Josh, to prove his point. It doesn't really prove anything though- it just distracts them, makes Tyler feel safe and good for the first time since he started people-watching. Why can't he just stay in the cosmos with Josh, feeling truly connected, truly full of knowledge? Why does he have to keep wiping the slate clean, forcing himself to live a life where he'll never know the comfort he knows now?

 

“Alright,” Josh says, and to Tyler's disappointment he moves away. “Watch.” Josh drifts down to the water's surface. It's cold and foggy today, so a light mist sits above the first few inches of the river. Josh reaches out a tendril of energy and swipes at the water. He phases under the surface a little, and then comes back up. The water and the fog remain still.

“Nothing happens,” Josh points out. “There's no consecquence for me doing that. I didn't learn anything. What was the point?”

“You didn't hurt anyone,” Tyler argues.

“True,” Josh concedes. “but not everything we do out there hurts someone.”

“Oh yeah?” Tyler challenges. Josh breezes over the stubbornness and keeps talking.

“Yeah. Remember when we were in the Andes? Building that city together?” Tyler remembers: vast green mountains, cradling them in safety and beauty. Children obsessed with their clay dolls and dyed cloth. “Or when we met on that ship?” Disease, hope, disease, death, and warmth. They'd slept in the same cot every night and no one had cared. They were close all the time, so close, and when they landed on New World soil they couldn't bear to be apart. The love Tyler had felt for Josh had been so strong in that life- but it was never _cosmic_. “Or when we orcas?”

Tyler immediately protests that point.

“Dude we were _assholes_ back then!”

Josh shrugs

“Yeah okay fair enough... but man, like- think of all the good stuff- and the bad- it all meant _something_. What if none of that had ever happened?”

“Then I'd still be here,” Tyler says. He watches as Josh drifts back up to him.

“Yeah but you wouldn't be _you_ ,” Josh says. “And I wouldn't be me. And we wouldn't know what we know now.” Josh reaches for Tyler and pulls him close. Their spirits hum with light and love, stronger now, bolstered by the memories they share- lifetimes and lifetimes of them. Tyler wonders how it could be that even as a human, he's managed to love Josh so many times (in so many ways) without knowing anything that had happened before.

“Remember before we were like this?” Josh says, even as his energy caresses Tyler's. “We hadn't lived enough to know. This world was too young, we were fumbling around trying to understand- you, me and the others- we'd barely learned anything.”

“Yeah well... we were usually fish,” Tyler says.

“Yeah,” Josh nods, giggling. “But we became more and more... and then we could talk to each other, almost like we're talking now-”

“-and then we realized,” Tyler finishes. It's was so long- millennia- ago, but he hasn't forgotten- he can't.

“Yeah,” Josh nods. “So... imagine what we might realize this time around.”

Finally Tyler surrenders to the touch and the warmth, letting Josh curl around him. He doesn't want to argue anymore, but he's stubborn in every lifetime, fish or not.

“How much more could there possibly be?” he asks, taking a last, dwindling stand. Still, he knows Josh has won, and to be honest he's fine with that.

“Jump back in an find out,” Josh says, flashing the spiritual equivalent of a smirk. “I hear there are some openings.”

“Wait- _now_?” At Josh's effort, they start to move across the world, Tyler still cradled in his energy.

“Now, then- whenever. Time is an illusion,” Josh shrugs. Tyler does and doesn't roll his eyes.

“Josh-” Josh continues to carry him, across the river banks and then up over the misty forest. “I don't want to go if you won't tell me!”

Josh stops at that, relaxing his hold. Tyler moves away only enough for Josh to level with him.

“Okay, sorry,” Josh says. “It's 1988, and we're going to Columbus. We've never lived in that area before so...”

“Ugh, where even IS that?”

“North-ish,” Josh says. “Overcast, six months of winter. Right up your alley.”

“Oh shut up.”

“I will,” Josh says. “But come on Tyler, just tell me if you want to do it or not. We'd be in the same town. We'll meet eventually. We always do.”

He's right, but it's still not enough. Still doesn't change the fact that Tyler's restless, unsatisfied.

“I don't just want to _meet_ this time,” Tyler says. “I want to do something- I want to _change_ something. I don't want to just- hang on and survive.” He sighs. “Please, promise me Josh. I know it's not all pointless, but I still just need... purpose.”

“Purpose,” Josh repeats. “Yeah Tyler, I promise... for whatever it's worth now, before we forget it all.”

“It's worth it,” Tyler says. He wants to assure Josh that they won't forget, but he can't. They'll always lose their memories- that's how this works. They'll be born kicking and screaming, and they won't remember a damn thing for any number of years.

Maybe it's foolish but Tyler feels like this time will be different, like deep down some part of him _could_ remember this... but it's a fool's hope. There's no way to know what will happen, or if either of them will keep their promise; he'll just have to cast his line and find out.

 

 

Twenty odd years later, Tyler Joseph spots a face across the hall that's both familiar and not. He's not sure he has the energy to mingle right now- his mind is already buzzing with so many things. Had the show been okay? Was it really worth it going up there and screaming at his piano, and was he really helping anyone- or just himself?

Still his feet carry him over, and his brain suddenly quiets its noise. Instead he's left to dwell on the feeling that maybe things _are_ okay, and maybe this _is_ worth it- or will be someday.

Tyler reaches the face, a young man who suddenly smiles and waves. “Hi,” he says, shining like a spirit. “I'm Josh.”

“I'm Tyler.”

Josh laughs, and gestures up to the stage that Tyler's just performed on for the last hour.

“I know who you are,” he says.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know?? It's not either of the fics I should be finishing right now, but when something wants to be written I can't just NOT write it... I hope it's not too weird.


End file.
